JONAH!

Sometimes lately Jonah drives me crazy. Like today for instance, he and the girls and I were walking along the boulevard and he thought it would be a good idea to run toward traffic. When I chased him down and got to him he told me he was not my friend.
Not my friend!
Luckily God made him so beautiful and perfect in every other way. I cant help but forgive him, I cant help but cherish these last few moments of babyhood as I watch his fat feet fade to big boy toes and his chubby cheeks thin out. As I watch his baby language turn in to statements and facts and I grapple with my last child growing up. As he begged to be carried for that last long stretch of the boulevard today I made it a growing mantra to love this moment as it could be the last time he really wants me to do this. In Buddhism challenging people are always seen as opportunities to learn and I have Jonah to thank for many lessons. He has taught me tremendous patience and compassion and forced me to wake up to the present moment. I am so grateful.

I found our camera that apparently we had lost in our move but I had failed to even notice it was gone! Here are some pictures off of it from two years ago! Wow, how fast time goes by.....

Perspective

Life is so mysterious and unpredictable. One moment the road can be moving along without a hitch and the next there is a storm of unforeseen events all lined up like Jonah's little dominoes ready to tip over one at a time. Yesterday I woke up with a ton of energy and tackled the day. I exercised with vigor and finished my list and created more lists to complete. I balanced my check book and thought about upcoming expenses and then moved on away from the worry.
Today I woke up with a sense of dread. The sky was dark and the weather was shaky and the birthday party we were planning to go to fell through. On another day this would have been a wonderful opportunity but today it was a stuck in the house feeling, Gary walking out the door early for the whole day and night looking back at the five of us wondering what to do.
It wasn't a disastrous day. This is really my point. I guess I imagined it would be a disaster with my mood in the morning and the overall feeling in the house. Sadie and I had a moment to have a really good talk about some of the struggles that she had recently with friends and I mean we got some really deep seated issues out on to the forefront. Jonah and I snuggled and played a lot, we read some books and he went to bed relatively easy for me. Nora was a little wild today but it wasn't like a disaster, just not the day I had planned in my head.
One of my favorite quotes is by John Lennon and it goes "Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans." It is from the song "Beautiful Boy" and I always loved this quote. That's the way life is.
I had been counting on a lot of extra money over this week by taking a bunch of shifts with Emergency Services. Last night I was the only clinician on call and I didn't get called out once. Today I am on call from 5-12 and I showered and was ready to go out at 5 but I haven't gotten called and it is close to 10.
This is the way life moves. In my Buddhist group we use the phrase "the stormy seas of samsara" to talk about life here on earth and I feel like seeing things from this angle is surprisingly refreshing. It is what it is and as the mystery unfolds so does my perspective on my life, the life of my children and humankind.